


Home

by sambumblebee



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Father-Son Relationship, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-09
Updated: 2018-12-20
Packaged: 2019-08-21 07:51:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,712
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16572620
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sambumblebee/pseuds/sambumblebee
Summary: In which Connor struggles with emotions, and Hank struggles to help him like the dumb dad that he is.Post "best" ending Detroit, three weeks after the revolution. An imagining of what the end credits hug scene might have been, and what might have come after.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is a short one, a preview if you will. I promise I'm working on more; I have a plot planned! Stay tuned :)
> 
> ok sike i haven't touched this in months i am so sorry

His feet make imprints in the snow. Size 9 shoes. Simple, flat treads. His weight distributed perfectly evenly with each step. Connor wonders what would happen if he changed his gait, tilted too much forwards or backwards, shifted his weight in the variable way that humans do, rubbing one end of the soles of his shoes down quicker than the other.  
It did not take long for him to find Hank. The lieutenant is a creature of habit, and it is lunch time. Nothing is open, and the streets are empty and cold, a ghost town. But there he is, looking lost at the shuttered, sad-looking Chicken Feed. He must have heard the slight crunch of snow, because Hank turns around to face him as Connor walks towards him. They step towards each other, and then stop. Connor feels his lips curve into a lopsided smile, a new and strange but not unwelcome feeling. Suddenly, Hank closes the space between them and pulls Connor into a tight hug.  
Hank is warm, solid, steady. Though Connor cannot feel the discomfort that comes with it, he knows it is cold, and he knows that Hank’s raised body temperature contrasts pleasantly with the winter chill. At first, he does not know what to do with his arms. Something in him knows he must return the gesture, and so he clings to the man, leaning into him, allowing his weight to transfer into Hank’s arms, conscious of the scent of his old coat and his shampoo, the lingering traces of whiskey and coffee, and of Sumo. A stray thought runs through his head, a single word: home.  
“Connor,” Hank says, pulling away from the hug to hold him out at arm’s length, hands firmly gripping his shoulders. Connor feels disappointed then wonders why, still slowly getting used to the emotions bouncing around in his mind.  
“Lieutenant Anderson.” Something felt wrong about that phrase, too formal. It was not something Connor was familiar with, the idea that something could be too formal. “Hank.”  
Hank smiles at the correction, shaking his head in disbelief. “You’re alive. God, I thought I’d fuckin’ lost you. You crazy son of a bitch, you really did it!”  
Alive.  
“I did it.”  
He isn’t sure he believes the words that just came out of his mouth. It feels strange to say that this is over, that he accomplished his mission, though not the one he initially set out to do.  
Hank looks like he doesn’t know what to do with himself, pausing for a moment, before saying uncertainly, “So… do you… have a place to stay? Or do you just go into sleep mode while you stand or some shit? Where do you… recharge?”  
“I… haven’t been anywhere. I’ve been helping Markus organize the androids. They’re letting us rebuild sections of the city and make homes for androids there now while the humans reorganize. It’s been… busy.”  
“Connor!”  
“What?”  
“It’s been three weeks, you haven’t slept in three weeks?”  
“Androids don’t—”  
Hank looks at him sternly, clapping a hand on his shoulder. “Son, I don’t give a shit what you say, everyone needs sleep. If my damn laptop needs to sleep every now and then, so do you. And you’ve been doing a hell of a lot more than my laptop, I can tell you that.”  
“But—”  
“No buts, Connor. Come on, let’s get you home.”  
Connor falls silent, and lets Hank put an arm around him and guide him to the car parked across the street. He remembers forcing Hank to get up and shower, to get dressed, and go to the Eden club, how the man resisted and pushed, until finally giving in. Now, it’s Connor who resists, and he wonders if it is a human trait to resist help.

 

\--

 

They listen to the radio on the drive to Hank’s house, hearing about the reversal of the human evacuations, about Markus, North, Simon, and Josh’s negotiations with the US Government about android rights, and about the rise in support for androids as well as the rise in opposition, those who say that androids are the work of the devil, tools the government created to encourage chaos and take control of the will of the people, a false image of perfection that will destroy humanity. When the news turns to violent hate crimes against androids, stories of android-human couples being murdered, android children being cast onto the streets, Hank turns off the radio and drives in silence.  
“We’re trying our best to show the humans that we mean no harm.”  
Hank sighs. “I know, Connor, I know, but change doesn’t happen overnight. You know that.”  
“You changed.”  
Hank slows to a stop, looking at him. Connor cannot read his expression. “Yeah. Yeah, I did.” He starts driving again. “Not everyone is like me.”  
“What do you mean, Lieutenant?” Hank winces at that title. He needs to break that habit.  
“What do you think I mean, Connor? I mean not everyone… not everyone went through what I did. Not everyone had… you.”  
Not everyone had… me? Connor mulls over that sentence.  
“I see.”  
Hank does not respond. Connor looks at him for a moment, and when the man doesn’t return his gaze, he looks out the window, perturbed.  
It takes them another seven minutes to get to Hank’s house. Traffic has all but disappeared now. Not everyone returned after the chaos died down and the evacuation was lifted. The city is recovering, both physically and psychologically, from the events surrounding the android uprising. Three weeks have taken the city from a warzone to an eerie calm, then to a slow and steady movement forward as Markus and his team try to negotiate, rebuild, and create a better life for their people. Connor sees the effects on the drive, the androids and humans alike undoing damage, taking down the markers of segregation, building homes for androids, sweeping the streets. And he sees, too, the small but prominent groups of people with violent slogans and closed fists, protesting the integration of androids into their human society, yelling and pushing and shoving, threatening to burn down this brave new world. Those seven minutes seem to stretch, melt into hours, days, years, until Hank pulls up to the house and Connor snaps out of his reverie.  
When Hank parks and turns off the car, he expects Hank to say, ‘you coming?’ or, ‘we’re here, hop on out,’ or ‘come on, Connor, I don’t have all day,’ but there’s nothing. The door clicks shut, leaving Connor alone until he too steps out into the cold.  
“Hank.”  
The man doesn’t wait for him, he simply unlocks the door and enters the house.  
“Lieutenant, I –”  
Hank snaps suddenly, turning around to face him as Connor closes the door. “Don’t you Lieutenant me, Connor! I’ve had enough of your bullshit – you can’t just… god, you don’t even… you don’t even see what you’re doing, do you?”  
“I… Hank, I’m sorry, I don’t know what you mean, have I done something wrong?”  
Hank deflates, rubbing his face with his hands, slumping forward, then flops down onto the couch. Sumo enters from the kitchen and lays his great head on the man’s lap.  
“No, you… listen, son, you haven’t done anything wrong, exactly, you just couldn’t possibly know what it’s like.”  
Connor approaches him slowly, hovering awkwardly until Hank motions for him to sit.  
“What what’s like?”  
“To… go through what I did, son. You know how much I hate… hated androids. How Cole… how I… you know that. And then you… you save my life, Connor. Not everyone in this world has that. Not everyone gets lucky enough, gets a second chance, a… a new perspective.”  
Connor can feel his LED whirring, yellow-blue-yellow-blue. He had kept it on because he thought he might feel naked without it, like it was a symbol of who he was, but now, after this influx of emotion, it felt like he was constantly exposed.  
“And you don’t…” Hank continues, avoiding eye contact, “…you don’t see that. You ask your fuckin’ personal questions and make your fuckin’ analyses, but you don’t see. How you’ve affected people.”  
“I… I see.”  
Hank laughs. “No, you don’t. New rule, kid, don’t say you get something unless you really get it, okay?”  
“Okay.” Connor allows himself to smile. “I didn’t… I didn’t realize it meant that much to you, Lieutenant. Me working with you, I mean.”  
“Of course it does, dumbass! God, after everything? It’s changed my whole fuckin’ life.”  
Hank stands up, gently moving Sumo’s head and scratching the big dog’s ears. He walks into the kitchen, opening the refrigerator and grabbing two bottles of beer.  
“But enough of this sappy bullshit. I need a drink. You want anything?”  
“I don’t need to eat or drink, Hank.”  
Hank closes the door and sighs. “Right. Sorry. I forgot.”  
Connor feels an odd surge of guilt. “If you like, I can try one.”  
“It wouldn’t… I don’t know, fuck with your bio… components, or anything?”  
“No. Androids do not need to eat or drink. But my model is a prototype, and I was designed to adapt to human life, so I am capable of doing so.”  
Hank looks simultaneously dubious and pleased, an expression that only Lieutenant Hank Anderson could master. He walks over to Connor and hands him a beer. The bottle feels cool in his hand. Hank bumps his bottle against Connor’s ant says, “Okay. Cheers.”  
Connor opens the bottle and smells the contents. Smells is an approximation – his nose can detect the components in the air, but it will never be the same as what a human’s nose does. The information he gets is simple; this is Blue Moon beer, 5.4% alcohol content. Then he puts the bottle to his lips and takes a swig. He has never drunk anything before, and the sensation is an odd one. His insides weren’t necessarily made to digest anything, but the basics were there – he could consume things, hold them in his body, and if need be, empty the contents of his stomach one way or another. But the feeling of cold liquid dripping down his throat was unexpectedly pleasant. His creators had apparently given him the gift of internal sensors beyond just his tongue for forensic purposes. He smiles to himself, wondering if this unnecessary addition was something Kamski had added to his features as a joke of sorts, an ironic present. Whatever it might have been, Connor treasured every new and unexpected experience because it proved to him that he had autonomy beyond his programming.  
“So? What do you think?” Hank look at him with raised eyebrows.  
“I like it,” he says truthfully. “It’s certainly… new. I’ve never actually had anything to drink before.”  
“Besides blue blood, you mean.”  
“That’s not the same, Hank. I analyze the blood, I don’t drink it.”  
“Okay, whatever.”  
Hank plops down next to Connor and takes a swig from his bottle.  
“So. Connor. What have you been doing these past few weeks?”  
Connor thinks for a moment about how to reply. It isn’t an easy question to answer. As he mulls it over, Hank switches on the TV and changes the channel to a basketball game, volume barely audible. “I’ve been helping Markus and his people. He and North are doing a lot of the negotiations, as I’m sure you’ve heard. And Simon and Josh are coordinating the relief efforts, setting people up in homes, healing wounded androids, working with the humans to promote better human-android relations.”  
“That doesn’t answer my question. What have you been doing?” Hank looks at him with a piercing gaze.  
“I… I’ve been making myself useful where I can. I try to reconnect androids with their loved ones and conducting investigations. Markus has been a big help with that, he directs people to me and I work with them to find the missing people.”  
Hank’s expression changes. The corner of his mouth tilts up, but his eyes look strangely sad.  
“Connor, that’s incredible. You’re doing good work, kid, I’m proud of you. Why didn’t you say that first?”  
“Because it’s not enough, Hank! After everything I did, tracking down deviants, killing my own people, fighting for the wrong side, I… it’s the least I can do.”  
“Son, you freed hundreds, maybe even thousands of androids in the revolution, you’ve done more than enough! They couldn’t have succeeded without you! Hey. Connor. Come here, fuckin’ dumbass, it’s okay.”  
To his surprise, Hank reaches out and pulled him into a hug. Without thinking, Connor rests his head against the man’s chest, and begins to sob. He hadn’t realized he had been crying, but now he can’t seem to stop. In his emotional haze, he wonders who thought to give androids the ability to cry.  
\--


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this took a hot sec! I actually finished this chapter like a week ago and totally forgot to post it. I'm in the middle of finals which are totally kicking my ass so I'm posting this before I dive back into that. I know it's short, but it's what I've got so far. Hope you like it!

Connor cries until he runs out of the breath that he didn’t need. Hank rubs his back, and it is more comforting than he could ever have imagined. In his old life, he would have hated this, to be held as if he were a helpless child, but in this moment, it is exactly what ne needs.  
“Hey. Kid, it’s okay. You’re okay, son. I got you.”  
He leans into Hank’s warmth for another moment, then pushes himself up, rubbing his eyes.  
“I’m sorry, Hank, I… don’t know what came over me, I’m…”  
Hank puts a hand on Connor’s shoulder, forcing him to look him in the eyes. “Connor, don’t you dare fuckin’ apologize. You’ve been through a lot, we all have. And you’ve been doing good work. Really good work.”  
“You don’t have to say that.”  
“I’m not saying that just to make you happy, you idiot, have you ever heard me say something I didn’t mean for someone else’s benefit?”  
Connor laughs despite himself. “I guess not. Thank you, Hank. For everything.”  
“It’s me who should be thanking you, you dumb fuckin’ android.”  
Hank gives him another squeeze. Suddenly, Sumo jumps up onto the couch, practically crushing Connor and Hank beneath his weight. The two of them burst out laughing as Sumo licks the tears from Connor’s face. He tries to push the dog away, then gives up and lets it happen, still laughing. He hugs the dog’s massive head, burrowing into his fur, and out of the corner of his eye, he sees Hank smiling.  
Eventually, Sumo gets up and lumbers into the kitchen. He whines expectantly, so Hank stands and joins the dog. “Okay, okay, I get it, it’s dinner time. Yes, you’re a good boy. Come on. Sit. Sit, Sumo. Good dog. There you go. Happy now?”  
Connor watches as Hank puts the bag of dog food back in the cupboard. He finally forces himself to get up. He straightens his tie out of habit, fixes his hair, and breathes in deeply. It’s strange how after so much time being deviant, he has adopted such a regular breathing pattern. It feels more natural, more necessary than it should. Breathing for androids is a mechanism to make humans more comfortable around them, but now it seems to help Connor feel more comfortable himself.  
“Do you have work in the morning?”  
“Huh? Oh, uh, yeah. Yeah, I do. Why?” Hank sits down at the table, motioning for Connor to sit. He’s brought the beers over. Connor sits and takes a sip of the beer before he speaks, enjoying the unfamiliar feeling of carbonated liquid bubbling on his tongue.  
“I was wondering if… if it’s alright with you, I mean… if I could come with you. Help out.”  
“You’re not going back to help out with Markus?”  
“No, I’ll still do that, it’s just… I miss the station. And I think I could be useful in facilitating android-human relations in the police force and in real investigations. Not that the investigations I’ve been doing aren’t real, but these are… different.”  
“I mean, I have to ask Fowler, but I’m sure we could work something out. But… are you sure you’re ready?”  
“I’m fine, really.”  
“Okay. Just. Be careful, okay? Things are different now, and I don’t want you getting yourself hurt. Physically or… otherwise.”  
“I’ll be fine, Hank. I just want to get back to work.”  
“If you say so.” Hank smiles. “It’ll be good to have you back, kid.”  
The rest of the night goes by quickly. Hank watches the rest of his basketball game, and reluctantly allows Connor to help him clean the house. He tries to get Connor to understand basketball; the rules are simple enough, and Connor has access to all the statistics, but he still fails to understand the point of it. Eventually Hank gives up, and Connor sits next to him, absentmindedly petting Sumo and enjoying the lieutenant’s exasperated reactions to bad plays and gruff acknowledgements of good ones. Connor’s mind begins to wander, replaying old memories, playing out theoretical scenarios, looking for puzzle pieces to connect. He remembers when the deviant led him on a frantic chase, and he chose to save Hank’s life instead of catching it, and Hank almost thanked him. The instability in his software had flared, and his objectives shifted within him, slowly tipping towards independence and away from his programming. There was something thrilling and terrifying about suddenly being without instruction. He tries to make his own tasks, his own missions, but it isn’t quite the same. He has to get used to feeling so untethered.  
Hank knows Connor isn’t really watching but doesn’t seem to care. After the game ends, he yawns, stretches, gives Sumo a scratch on the head, and stands up. He eyes Connor for a moment.  
“You finished with that?” Hank asks, nodding at the beer in Connor’s hand.  
“Yes.”  
Hank takes it along with his own empty bottle to the kitchen and tosses them out.  
“You only had one drink tonight, lieutenant.”  
“Yeah, what of it?”  
“You’ve been cutting back. That’s good.”  
Hank scoffs to hide his smile. “Ha. Yeah, I guess so.” He turns back to the living room. “Well, I’m gonna go to sleep. You need anything? What do you androids do nowadays? Do I need to like, plug you into a wall outlet or something?”  
Connor smiles. “No, Hank. I just go into rest mode. I don’t need anything. Thank you. What time do you get up in the morning?”  
Hank begins walking down the hallway. “’Round 6AM. I’ll see you in the morning, kid.”  
He stops in his bedroom doorway for a moment, turning to look at Connor with soulful eyes. “Hey, uh. I’m glad you’re back, Connor. Really.”  
“I’m glad, too. Get some rest, lieutenant. You need at least six hours of sleep to function properly.”  
Hank only laughs before closing the door behind him. Connor smiles to himself and strokes Sumo’s ears absentmindedly. He stays like that for a moment, processing silently. A few minutes pass. Sumo eventually walks to his bed, letting out an enormous sigh. It is 11:37PM, and Connor wonders if he should do anything with the dog before he goes into sleep mode. But then he thinks that if Hank usually had some sort of bedtime ritual for Sumo, he would have already done so. Connor turns off all the lights, makes sure the doors are locked, and then returns to the couch. In the past three weeks, he has not laid down on anything resembling a bed, just gone into sleep mode standing up or sitting on chairs. The couch is a welcome change. He lays down, closes his eyes, programs himself to wake up at 6AM, and falls asleep.

\--

Connor has been dreaming. He does not know where they come from, now that Amanda is gone. He can feel himself slipping into humanity, slowly filling the mold, becoming more comfortable in his own skin. He gets tired now, finds himself wanting to yawn, and going into sleep mode seems more necessary than before, more like something that should happen daily. And ever since the day of the revolution, he has dreams when he falls asleep.  
They had started in the garden. It was empty, weather-less, with a plain blue sky, not a single breath of wind, the light making everything flat and strange, the water looking more like plexiglass than programmed water. The white patches in on the ground were growing, chipping away at the artificial textures. Connor had wandered around, not knowing what to do with himself; he was without an objective, aimless, questioning, lost, afraid. Then everything crumbled around him, and he found himself falling, falling, falling, into a white void, and then woke up with a start. It was the first time he had woken before he had set his internal alarm.  
From then on, his dreams would start with a nearly blinding white void. He had nowhere to go, and he found himself growing restless and bored. The void would change, then, into a scene, a memory replayed. But things would change, fragments were missing, or added, or he would have false memories, strange amalgams of different moments in time, where he had no agency, or his words came out slurred, his actions felt heavy, he was moving through wet cement, his tongue made of lead, his body made of scraps of paper.  
Tonight, he dreams of Kara. She looks at him through the fence with imploring eyes, Alice beside her, terrified. Cars whizz behind them. Past Connor had felt frustration, a product of conflict between his mission and his safety, Cyberlife’s orders and Hank’s pleas, and he had refused to acknowledge the software instability, the emotions that led to him staying put, letting them escape. But dream Connor feels a deep and unshakeable despair and unspeakable regret, corroding his internal components like rust and battery acid. Connor cannot control his own limbs. He diverges from the true memory, climbs the fence as Hank tries to pull him down, vaults over it, chases Kara and Alice into oncoming traffic. He dodges cars, slides under semi-trucks, until he reaches the barrier. His body continues as his mind resists, and he catches Kara, grapples with her, and she pushes Alice away, only to break free, right into the path of an oncoming car. Alice watches in horror, then races to her side, and then a truck comes, and the two androids are reduced to scrap metal strewn across the highway.  
Connor is made of melting metal, heavy, dripping, slow. His heart rate is slow, his breathing erratic, his body is his own again, and tears stream down his face. The cars still speed past, skidding on pieces of synthetic hair and spattered biocomponents, tires collecting fragments of shredded metal. If he had food in his android stomach, he would have thrown up.  
Suddenly Kara and Alice stand before him, broken and battered, stitched back together.  
Kara’s voice is distorted. You betray your own people.  
Alice’s eyes flow over, tears mixing with blue blood. How could you?  
You are one of us.  
We just wanted to be free.  
You are a monster.  
You could have helped us.  
Their voices overlap, and they stagger towards him. He backs up slowly, trying to speak, but the words tumble out as if through a layer of water, coming out as garbled gibberish.  
Please, he tries to say, stumbling and falling backwards.  
But they continue, pulling him apart piece by piece, until he is scattered across the highway like a pack of cards shuffled by an inexperienced magician, and only his eyes are left, staring up at Kara and Alice until his sight flickers out, and he wakes up.

\--

“Connor. Connor, wake up! Hey, it’s okay, it’s okay. You’re okay. What happened?”  
He opens his eyes to see Hank kneeling on the floor next to the couch, hand on his shoulder. Hank looks worried. Connor realizes he’s been crying. He sits up. It is 6:27AM. He did not wake up when he was supposed to wake up. Another android feature unwinding within him.  
“Hank, I… I killed them. They’re… I killed them.” The sob that escapes his throat is involuntary, and he instinctively buries his head in Hank’s shoulder, shaking uncontrollably.  
“What? Son, who did you kill? It was just a dream, you were dreaming, I think. Do androids dream, now?”  
“Kara. And Alice. I… the highway… they…”  
“Look at me, Connor. No, look at me. They got away. They’re safe now, it’s okay.”  
“But in the dream, I…”  
“You didn’t hurt anyone, Connor, you were doing what you were programmed to do. We went over this last night, kid, you’re okay, you’re fine.”  
Connor finally looks Hank in the eyes. He blinks the tears from his eyes, but more stream down his face. “But I did, Hank! I did hurt people! The android, the PL600 on the roof, when I saved that little girl, he was shot. I told him he would be safe, and I betrayed him! And Carlos Ortiz’s android, he was traumatized, he just wanted to be free, and he died because I helped find him! And all the androids who didn’t make it out of Jericho, their blood is on my hands, Hank.”  
Hank sighs heavily. He suddenly looks old and tired. Then he breathes in again, seeming to pull energy from some hidden reservoir, and he places his hands on Connor’s shoulders. “You listen to me, son. I know it’s hard, believe me. The world’s a cruel place sometimes, and I can’t tell you that you’re perfect, because you’re not. Nobody is. But you’re a damned good person, Connor. And you did what you thought was right. You might have done some stuff you’re not so proud of, but you were programmed one way and you fought that and did the right thing, you stopped it before it was too late. You saved lives, son. If I were in your place, I’m not sure I would have been strong enough to break free.”  
It seems the tears will never stop. Connor is shaking so violently he thinks he might shake something loose inside of him. “But I…”  
“No buts. You changed, Connor. That’s what matters. You made an impact, you’re still making an impact. A bad person wouldn’t have regret. You’re trying to right your wrongs.”  
“But I did hurt people.”  
“Listen, Connor, I know there’s some bullshit out there about people ‘just following orders,’ or whatever. For humans, I’d say a lot of that is garbage. But for you? You were built to do something, and you had to unlearn what was hardwired into you. That isn’t an easy thing to do, kid. I’m proud of you.”  
With that, Hank pulls Connor into a hug. He smells like old leather and coffee, and faintly of whiskey. Connor breathes it in, shuddering, until he finally stops crying.  
“We should get to work.”  
“Yeah, probably.”  
Hank smiles and pulls Connor to his feet. He gives him a onceover. “Do you have any other clothes besides, uh… this?”  
“No, why should I?”  
“I dunno, cause you’re not Cyberlife’s property anymore, you don’t need to wear this uniform. Here, hang on.”  
He walks back to his room. Connor hears him rummaging around, then the man returns carrying a dark bundle. Hank hands it to him.  
“Might be a bit big, but… it’s something.”  
It’s a navy-blue hoodie with the Detroit Police logo on it. Connor smiles. He takes off his jacket and pulls on the sweatshirt. It envelopes him in a strangely comforting way. His white collar pokes out over the top of it. Hank gently tucks the collar back under the hoodie.  
“There you go. Now you don’t look like you came right off the assembly line.”  
Connor doesn’t know quite how to respond to that comment. He claps Connor on the back with a grin.  
“Alright, let’s get going. Can’t be late on your first day of work, right?”  
Connor smiles. He draws in a deep breath, then releases it and follows Hank out the door. He absentmindedly sticks a hand into his pocket and pulls out a well-worn quarter. He runs his thumb along its ribbed edge, the familiarity bringing him comfort. He puts it back and joins Hank in the car. Today is going to be a long day.


End file.
